feudalism

definition
-  it’s difficult to really define feudalism, since there were countless different variations on the theme through the Middle Ages, to the point where some historians want to stop using the term altogether. However, broadly speaking, it was a system of personal relations between landholders. Somebody with some kind of authority over a territory would “farm out” his authority over some of his land to somebody else in return for some kind of service. That subsidiary landlord could similarly subdivide his domain, and so on down the ladder. And it was never, ever the clean, top-down hierarchy which emerged as an idealized picture of the feudal system only after it fell out of use.https://www.quora.com/Why-didnt-the-Roman-Empire-adopt-feudalism-It-seems-like-a-fairly-effective-way-to-manage-this-large-of-an-empire

A fief (/ˈfiːf/; Latin: feudum) was the central element of feudalism and consisted of heritable property or rights granted by an overlord to a vassal who held it in fealty (or "in fee") in return for a form of feudal allegiance and service, usually given by the personal ceremonies of homage and fealty. The fees were often lands or revenue-producing real property held in feudal land tenure: these are typically known as fiefs or fiefdoms. However, not only land but anything of value could be held in fee, including governmental office, rights of exploitation such as hunting or fishing, monopolies in trade, and tax farms.
- In ancient Rome a "benefice" (from the Latin noun beneficium, meaning "benefit") was a gift of land (precaria) for life as a reward for services rendered, originally, to the state. In medieval Latin European documents, a land grant in exchange for service continued to be called a beneficium (Latin).^[1] Later, the term feudum, or feodum, began to replace beneficium in the documents.^[1] The first attested instance of this is from 984, although more primitive forms were seen up to one hundred years earlier.^[1] The origin of the feudum and why it replaced beneficium has not been well established, but there are multiple theories, described below. The most widely held theory is put forth by Marc Bloch that it is related to the Frankish term *fehu-ôd, in which *fehu means "cattle" and -ôd means "goods", implying "a moveable object of value." When land replaced currency as the primary store of value, the Germanic word *fehu-ôd replaced the Latin word beneficium. This Germanic origin theory was also shared by William Stubbs in the nineteenth century. A theory put forward by Archibald R. Lewis that the origin of 'fief' is not feudum (or feodum), but rather foderum, the earliest attested use being in Astronomus's Vita Hludovici (840). In that text is a passage about Louis the Pious which says annona militaris quas vulgo foderum vocant, which can be translated as "(Louis forbade that) military provender which they popularly call 'fodder' (be furnished)." A theory by Alauddin Samarrai suggests an Arabic origin, from fuyū (the plural of fay, which literally means "the returned", and was used especially for 'land that has been conquered from enemies that did not fight'). Samarrai's theory is that early forms of 'fief' include feo, feu, feuz, feuum and others, the plurality of forms strongly suggesting origins from a loanword. First use of these terms was in Languedoc, one of the least-Germanized areas of Europe and bordered Muslim Spain, where the earliest use of feuum as a replacement for beneficium can be dated to 899, the same year a Muslim base at Fraxinetum (La Garde-Freinet) in Provencewas established. It is possible, Samarrai says, that French scribes, writing in Latin, attempted to transliterate the Arabic word fuyū (the plural of fay), which was being used by the Muslim invaders and occupiers at the time, resulting in a plurality of forms - feo, feu, feuz, feuum and others - from which eventually feudum derived. Samarrai, however, also advises medieval and early modern Muslim scribes often used etymologically "fanciful roots" in order to claim the most outlandish things to be of Arabian or Muslim origin. In the 10th and 11th centuries the Latin terms for fee could be used either to describe dependent tenure held by a man from his lord, as the term is used now by historians, or it could mean simply "property" (the manor was, in effect, a small fief). It lacked a precise meaning until the middle of the 12th century, when it received formal definition from land lawyers. In English usage, the word "fee" is first attested around 1250–1300 (Middle English); the word "fief" from around 1605–15. In French, the term "fief" is found from the middle of the 13th century (Old French), derived from the 11th-century terms "feu" "fie". In French, one also finds "seigneurie" (land and rights possessed by a "seigneur" or "lord", 12th-century), which gives rise to the expression "seigneurial system" to describe feudalism.
- A list of several hundred such fees held in chief between 1198 and 1292, along with their holders' names and form of tenure, was published in three volumes between 1920 and 1931 and is known as The Book of Fees; it was developed from the 1302 Testa de Nevill.

• Sir Henry Maxwell-Lyte in his preface to the latest edition, suggests that the documents transcribed into the "Book of Fees" stem from two major collections of records:The first dates from the reign of King John (1199–1216) and was long known as the Testa de Nevill or Neville, 'Head of Nevill'. The Classical Latin word testa literally means 'burnt clay; earthen container, pot, urn', but was also used in a transferred sense to mean 'shell, covering'.^[1] In the Low Latin of the Middle Ages, the word had acquired the meaning 'skull' or 'head' (whence the French word for 'head', tête)^[2], for which the Classical Latin word is caput.The second collection consisted of two or more rolls of parchment, one of which is still extant, headed by the title Serjantie arentate per Robertum Passelewe tempore Regis H. filii Regis Johannis, meaning "Concerning the serjeanties let by Robert Passelewe in the time of King Henry III, son of King John".

- hkej 14jul17 shum article

europe

- ********https://www.quora.com/Would-it-have-been-possible-for-someone-living-in-Italy-in-1500-to-own-the-property-his-ancestor-owned-during-the-Roman-Empire The second decisive period for the transfer of land ownership was the Black Death of 1347–1351. During this period, a massive portion of Europe’s population — anywhere from 50 to 70% of Europeans — died of disease and accompanying problems like famine. This was a demographic disaster of unprecedented proportions, but for the people who survived, things actually got a lot better.Feudalism began to die after the plague. Large landowners no longer had enough tenant farmers or serfs to work their land. Labor was also a more limited commodity, giving the peasants more power and independence to bargain for better labor and living agreements. Many of them went out on their own, claimed abandoned plots of land, or founded towns. The power of landed nobles — and their land holdings — began to decline.Any Roman-descended nobles that still held estates likely had them wiped out in this period as their families were decimated by plague and their holdings siphoned off by newly enfranchised peasants.Making things more tough is the lack of any established geneological connection of any individual today to any individual in ancient Europe. This is to the modern day, but I would guess that in the 1500s, if modern genetic studies were possible, finding connections would be just as difficult.However, simply because there is no proven descent does not mean that such descent did not exist. If we speak purely in terms of possibility, it is definitely possible that some peasant just got insanely lucky and had his plot of land and family lineage remain intact through the years.But that’s just for normal situations. For one abnormal situation, I can definitively say that at least a few people in the year 1500 held the same property their ancestors in the Roman Empire did over a millennium earlier.The little country of San Marino was supposedly founded in 301, and there is evidence that a thriving community existed on Mount Titano as early as 511, indicating that the community was founded some time during the Roman Empire’s existence.In its centuries of existence, San Marino has only been militarily occupied three times. Never once was there a significant attempt to integrate it into surrounding city-states nor to restructure the ownership of property. Thus, it is plausible, if not likely, that at least one family from San Marino kept the same land holding, without interruption or disruption, from about 400 to 1500.

• ********with pic of Fortress of Guaita in San Marino

- A burgher was a rank or title of a privileged citizen of medieval towns in early modern Europe. Burghers formed the pool from which city officials could be drawn,^{[citation needed]} and their immediate families formed the social class of the medieval bourgeoisie.Entry into Burgher status varied from country to country and city to city. In Slovakia proof of ownership of property in a town was a condition for acceptance as a burgher.Any crime against a burgher was taken as a crime against the city community.^{[citation needed]} In Switzerland if a burgher was assassinated, the other burghers had the right to bring the supposed murderer to trial by judicial combat.In the Netherlands burghers were often exempted from "corvee" or forced labor, a privilege which later extended to the Dutch East Indies.^[4] Only burghers could join the city guard in Amsterdam because in order to join, guardsmen had to purchase their own equipment. Membership in the guard was often a stepping stone to political positions.

• Đại công dân Grand Burgher [male] or Grand Burgheress [female] (from German: Großbürger [male], Großbürgerin [female]) is a specific conferred or inherited title of medieval German origin and legally defined preeminent status granting exclusive constitutional privileges and legal rights (German: Großbürgerrecht),^[1] who were magnates and subordinate only to the Emperor, independent of feudalism and territorial nobility or lords paramount.^[1][2] A member class within the patrician ruling elite,^[1][3] the Grand Burgher was a type of urban citizen and social order of highest rank,^[1][2] a formally defined upper social class of affluent individuals and elite burgher families in medieval German-speaking city-states and towns under the Holy Roman Empire, who usually were of a wealthy business or significant mercantile background and estate.^[1][3] This hereditary title and influential constitutional status, privy to very few individuals and families across Central Europe, formally existed well into the late 19th century and early part of the 20th century.^[1] In autonomous German-speaking cities and towns of Central Europe that held a municipal charter, town privileges (German town law) or were a free imperial city such as Hamburg, Augsburg, Cologne and Bern that held imperial immediacy, where nobility had no power of authority or supremacy, the Grand Burghers (Großbürger) or patricians ("Patrizier") constituted the ruling class.Since before the 15th century the group of legally coequal "burghers" started to split into three different groups: hereditary grand-burghers, ordinary burghers termed petty-burghers (German Kleinbürger or simply Bürger) made up largely of artisans, tradesman, business owners, merchants, shopkeepers and others who were obliged according to city or town constitution to acquire the ordinary petty-burghership,^[1][3][4] and non-burghers, the latter being merely "inhabitants" or otherwise resident aliens without specific legal rights in the territorial jurisdiction of a city or town and largely consisted of the working class, foreign or migrant workers and other civil employees who were neither able nor eligible to acquire the ordinary petty-burghership.

- freeman

• In the Kingdom of England from the 12th to 15th centuries, a franklin was a member of a certain social class or rank. In the Middle English period, a franklin was simply a freeman; that is, a man who was not a serf. In the feudal system under which people were tied to land which they did not own, serfs were in bondage to a member of the nobility who owned that land. The surname "Fry", derived from the Old English "frig" ("free born"), indicates a similar social origin.The meaning of the word "franklin" evolved to mean a freeholder; that is, one who holds title to real property in fee simple. In the 14th and 15th centuries, franklin was "the designation of a class of landowners ranking next below the landed gentry".With the definite end of Feudalism, this social class disappeared as a distinct entity. The legal provisions for "a free man" were applied to the general population. The memory of that class was preserved in the use of "Franklin" as a surname.According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the term "franklin" is derived from Middle English franklen, frankeleyn, francoleyn, from Anglo-Latin francalanus a person owning francalia, "territory held without dues". Collins mentions the Anglo-French fraunclein, "a landowner of free, but not noble birth", from Old French franc free + -lein, "-ling", formed on the model of "chamberlain". All these go back to Late Latin francus "free" or "a free man", from Frankish *Frank, "a freeman", literally, "a Frank"; cognate with Old High German Franko.The social class of franklin, meaning (latterly) a person not only free (not in feudal servitude) but also owning the freehold of land, and yet not even a member of the "landed gentry" (knights, esquires and gentlemen, the lower grades of the upper class) let alone of the nobility (barons, viscounts, earls/counts, marquis, dukes), evidently represents the beginnings of a real-property-owning middle class in England during the 14th and 15th centuries.^{[citation needed]}Note that the land and property owned by this English middle class might well be in a rural area. This is one factor distinguishing this class from the mainland European bourgeoisie, a social class whose name means "town-dwellers".Magna Carta gave rights to free men and the peasantry. "No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled. Nor will we proceed with force against him. Except by the lawful judgement of his equals or by the law of the land. To no one will we sell, to no one deny or delay right or justice."Unlike some other terms referring to social class or status in medieval England such as esquire and gentleman, franklin has no modern usage other than as a historical reference to the Middle Ages.Several English surnames are thought to derive from this class of people. They developed in the Middle Ages as a status surname, indicating a 'free man'. They derived from the Old French feudal term franchomme; composed of the elements 'franc' (in its original meaning 'free') and 'homme', man, from the Latin 'homo'. The various spellings gradually altered because of association with such common English placename suffixes such as '-combe' and '-ham'. The modern surname is found as (among other variations) Francombe, Frankcomb, Francom, Frankcom and Frankham.

• people
• Patrick T.A. Wong is the founder of the Tenacity Group and has over 20 years investment management experience in the United States and Asia. He was educated at Harrow School in London, UK, graduated from the Boston College Carroll School of Management in Massachusetts with a BA in Business Management, and also MBA / MS Accounting from Northeastern University, USA.  He is also a Certified Public Account (CPA) from the USA.Prior to founding Tenacity, he was a Portfolio Manager at Trust Company of the West, responsible for growth-oriented equity portfolios. Prior to TCW, Patrick worked at Merrill Lynch in New York, and Morgan Stanley in Tokyo. He is a Hong Kong Chapter Member of the Young Presidents' Organization – the international network of young CEOs - and is a certified accountant in the United States.Patrick is a member of the Hong Kong-Europe Business Council, which promotes trade, investment and economic cooperation between the business communities of Hong Kong and Europe.  Patrick is also a member of the Board of Trustees for Harrow School Development Trust - which seeks to provide financial support to exceptional pupils from a diverse range of abilities and backgrounds, regardless of their means. He is a Freeman of the City of London, a founding member of The EC Partnership (an emerging BID in the City) and a supporter of the ‘Sculpture in the City’ initiative.

Chinese

- 滋賀秀三- 華人家族繼承- 繼嗣(血統、姓氏)、繼祧(祖先拜祀、供奉)、繼產(物秶業財產的承接、對上一代的撫養照料)